Wherever He leads I'll go

Archive for April, 2014

Oh the things I could tell you about the latest adventure God sent me on. I could tell you about the beauty of the land in all of it’s tropical glory…white sand beaches, deep blue waters, bananas and coconuts hanging from trees and rich vegetation with vibrant colors.

Or I could tell you about the people. Children who don’t care if you speak their language because laughter is the same in any language. Loving children who just want you to play with them. School children interested in the Anglo people making balloon animals and sharing the Gospel with a cube and a bracelet. Children amazed at a church baptism because they had never seen a swimming pool before…not even the blow up pool we used. Old women making tortillas from scratch, offering your whole group a tortilla filled with eggs and peppers. Young women playing with their babies. Men helping in the installation of a new wood stove. All of them offering a beautiful smile and a simple but generous hospitality.

I could tell you about a way of life that you and I usually only see in movies and magazines. Houses made of sticks with grass roofs…a few of which also had satellite dishes for entertainment. An entire family sleeping in hammocks in one room. Ceilings black from the soot of fires made in the center of the room for cooking. Pens made of stones piled high to keep in a hog. Untreated water for drinking, cooking and cleaning. Laundry rooms consisting of a shallow tub and a water hose. Electrical wires run randomly to support a light bulb or even a fan or a television. Chickens running loose in every yard. And corn everywhere….the main staple in their diet.

Perhaps I could tell you about the ministry there. About Pastor Doug Millar who ministers to the Mayan people as well as to the Mexican and Anglo people in Playa Del Carmen and Paamul. About the three services he does in two different places on Sunday mornings and the one service he has on Wednesday nights as well as a worship service for the Mayan people on Fridays. Services that are held in open air churches with concrete floors and grass roofs as well as one in a hotel in the city. I could tell you about the 8 Mayan men and boys who were baptized as a result of this ongoing ministry in the Mayan villages. And the women, who all wear white dresses with brilliant, colorful embroidery, who were too embarrassed to be baptized in a blow up swimming pool so they came the day after we left to be baptized in the Gulf of Mexico.

I would surely tell you about how Doug’s ministry is providing wood burning stoves with exhausts that extend outside in as many Mayan homes as possible. And how these stoves make it possible to breathe a little more freely in a home once permeated with a strong smoky odor.

I could tell you about the humidity of 100% and the heat index of 120 degrees on a 90 degree day. The floors of an air conditioned hotel room sticky from the humidity outside. Lizards…big and ugly. Winds that never stop blowing. Me sweating and drinking water, sweating and drinking water, etc. The group fearing I might die on them. Mayan children turning fans on the big lady with the red face.

I could also tell you about a group that grew quite close as a result of this mission. Six unlikely people thrown together by God’s hand to discover and re-discover a ministry unlike any other. Six vastly different people with varying personalities who were able to laugh and even bicker with one another.

Finally, I could tell you about the trip home. A two hour ride on a Mexican bus after an hour’s wait in the heat. A line at the Mexican airport in Cancun that wrapped around and around and around. A rush to make a plane that was delayed three times, cancelled once and then finally arrived. A connecting flight in Houston that was long gone and the possibility of spending 12 hours in the Houston airport until “someone” found a hotel with a shuttle. “Someone” who would have given $1000.00 for a shower and a bed but all she had to pay was $70.00. “Someone” who was deliriously tired.

I could tell you all of this but I believe you would get more out of it if I showed you….Enjoy!